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“I have a book.” And the ability to put my attention elsewhere. Say, on Ms. Ida Beau. She’s an amazing woman. She’s even totally on trend, somehow making the Coastal Grandma white linen outfit into something sexy. And sexy in a mature way. In a way that saysI have all this knowledge and experience to impart.
“Anything good?” She raises a brow.
“Not by your standards.” I pull my Kindle from behind me and place it in her palms.
She wakes the device and scans the home screen. “None of this is dirty.” She points to an especially dry business book. “Well. Maybe this.”
“I told River the same thing.”
“Oh?” She raises a brow.
“Spreadsheets are sexy.”
This time, her laugh is soft. “We feel sexy in our element. We feel sexy when we feel competent.”
Is that it?
“Usually, we think of men that way. They want to feel useful. Sometimes, to an unhealthy degree. But it’s true for women, too.”
“Maybe that’s you,” I say. “Writing about sex.”
“It is me.” She nods. “And it’s you.”
My eyes go to Lexi and Fern and River. Even with Fern right there, Lexi wraps her hand around River’s arm.
She laughs as if he’s the funniest guy she’s ever met.
She’s flirting.
She’s going to keep flirting.
I need to stop her, but I’m already too tired of this.
“You’re not in your element here,” Ida says.
I force myself to look away, but Ms. Beau’s gaze isn’t any easier to take. “What are you talking about?”
“Your sister. Is she serious with that boy, Jake?”
“She was,” I say. “She…”
“Has cold feet?” Ida offers.
Yeah. That’s it exactly. I nod.
“I had them, too,” she says. “Even though I loved Benjamin. I loved everything about him. But I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be a wife. It wasn’t a great time to be a wife, but that was only part of it.” She looks at her grandson as he smiles back at Lexi. “There was another part, too. The same fears about forever.”
That’s hard to believe. “You look so happy in pictures.”
“We were. I was over the moon. But the second he mentioned marriage, I felt that fear. And your sister is like me.”
“Obsessed with sex?”
She laughs. “She values her freedom, but she loves him.”
“She does.”
“You want them together, too, don’t you?”
